Letters to the Editors

Peter Cox: Set Into Song

Thanks. Nice review -
hope you enjoyed the book, and it encourages a few more European readers to add to the five in Italy, two in Germany, and one in the Netherlands ...

Ben Harker's book
came out when I'd almost finished the manuscript of Set Into Song. It was a great checking tool, because his research is rigorous (though, not surprisingly, he didn't spot the reason for the delay in the first broadcast of The Ballad of John Axon - a small point in an otherwise excellent summary of them).
I think it's extremely well written and comprehensive. My only slight doubt is the tone. His depiction of MacColl 'warts and all' tends to over-emphasise the warts - the arrogance, the frequent rewriting of history - at the expense of his abundant generosity and humour. Peggy feels this quite strongly, though of course if you write a biography that the widow of the subject loves, you've probably pulled some punches somewhere ...

Anyway, a book long overdue. By the way, Manchester University Press is getting Ewan's autobiography Journeyman re-edited (by Ted Power), and it'll probably come out late in 2009.

I recently ran across your article from May 2007 about
the tune and the island of Inisheer.
Great article, thanks (this is so late you probably forgot about it).
I am trying to find contact information for Thomas Walsh as my humble local band wants to record one of his tunes.
Would you be able to forward me his address and/or email?

'Uilleann piper Sean Dempsey performed at the Olympic Games in Berlin in
1936; legend has it that there was no chair available and Dempsey played
while seated on the back of an SS officer.'
I found this piece of information on your
site.
Is there any way in which you could give me any more information on this
man. When I was a child (circa 1950 -1952) a neighbor of mine died. He
must have been a very young man at that time - a father of two young
children.

Sincerely, Derek J Brittain

The Companion to Irish Traditional Music (edited by Fintan Vallely, Cork University Press 1999)
has the following entry:

Dempsey, Seán. (b. 1910). Uilleann pipes. Born in Co. Kildare, he lived at Firhouse,
Tallaght, Co. Dublin. He played 'The Rakes of Kildare' with Leo Rowsome in Irish Hearts,
the first Irish sound movie in 1934. Taught by Rowsome, he broadcast regularly throughout
the 1940s, and often played abroad at festivals. He was passionately interested in flying
and was the first Irish person to be Station Engineer at Shannon Airport (1941). He played
at the World Folk Dance and Music festival at Berlin's Sports Palace in 1936 during the
controversial Olympics of that year. Rory O'Connor danced for him; a chair could not be
found so he played while sitting on the back of one of Hitler's storm-troopers. 'Sent for'
afterwards, his pipes were reputedly studied and admired by Hitler, Goering and Goebbels.

Spot Danny Kyle, Gerry Rafferty, ...

Dear Folk World.
Spot Danny Kyle, Gerry Rafferty, Paul Pilnick, The Whistle Binkies, Brian Wilson, Alex Campbell and other well known Scotia Bar regulars standing ootside at shutting time (2.30pm).
Can you help me name the rest?